“The Boxer” - Simon & Garfunkel

This is another song that is not just top 100, but perhaps in the top 5 most popular acoustic guitar songs. It’s not easy, but I believe every advanced guitar player gives it a go at some point. I have played/taught it for years along with “Dust in the Wind”, “Time in a Bottle”, & the rest of the folk/rock cannon. This versions special though cause of the melody (as if the normal way wasn’t tricky enough). I also went with a more modern strumming rhythm during the ‘Lie,lie,lie…’ part. I was trying to figure out how play it more like it is on Bridge Over Troubled Water, but then just said screw it I like it more like this…

I’m probably going to post a TAB of my version on here, as it differs pretty significantly from the one in the book. I tried playing it that way, but found the lack of a consistent bass rhythm kind of annoying. The alternating bass rhythm is really a big feature of the song, so I went with that - alternating mostly R-5-R-5 for all the chords. That allowed me to really focus on getting the higher strings to sing & hold the melodic rhythms - which are really unique and sad. Thought about the details in each lyric in realtime.

Oh also, this is capo at 5. Still key of C_Do, but the original is played using open position C. The capo at 5 makes C Do play the same as G Do for optimal use of the open strings. But it should sound like the same key as the record…. I hope so anyway.

ps. Sorry it took me a while to post this. I know I started off at a pretty fast clip, but things are pretty busy around here. Only so much time in the day. But along with not drinking, I do at least intend to stay on this resolution. I’ll try to do one of these like every 3 days or so. We’ll see.

“Blackbird” - The Beatles

Well, here it is folks. Was there ever any doubt that “Blackbird” would show up on this list? This must be THE most popular fingerpicking guitar song ever, & for good reason - actually more like hundreds of good reasons. I’ve been playing this song for many years, & still find new connections with it. This project gave me another chance to really take it apart & study it all over again.

The arrangement goes a bit beyond the traditional way McCartney plays it - & I’m not doing the claw-hammer thing. Most of what I was really paying attention to improving this time around was the right hand picking technique. Experimenting with how hitting the strings from different angles effects the sound, I tried to find the most suitable finger combinations for delivering each individual phrase. I was thinking a lot about the lyrics too. The TAB from the book has some brilliant tricks to get the vocal melody into the guitar arrangement. Which is great cause Blackbird can be kind of a hard song to sing. Like the rent, it’s just too damn high.

Also tempo seemed to be a big concern. I don’t know the exact BPM of this, & it probably changes throughout the length of the song. When I was listening back to some practice takes, I felt that slightly faster than this sounded rushed, & anything slower felt like a drag.

ps. Sorry for the pjs. This was supposed to be just a practice take to set up the video. But I have some other stuff I have do today, so we’re going with this.

Oh &, spoiler-alert, I think tomorrow’s “The Boxer”.

“Babe I’m Gonna Leave You” - Led Zeppelin

Over the years I’ve noticed that serious guitar players approach Led Zeppelin songs with a great deal of fidelity if not reverence. I was a little surprised that the TAB book deviated so much from the what is some of the most indelible fingerpicking ever recorded. For my version I chose to play the proper intro instead of the book’s simplified version. I also just had to include the more rawk strumming part & some of the other fun parts that come in at the tail end. The result is still an abridged version, but hopefully one that captures some of the dynamic qualities of the original.

I learned to play the intro riff years ago & guitar students often specifically ask me to go over it with them during lessons. It’s a twist on the classic Andalusian Cadence - which is a sort of bass line walk from A (La) down to E (Mi). The TAB from the book really helped me to add the vocal melody during the verse. Overall, I’d say this arrangement is a bit of a challenge. As you can see in the video, over-the-top thumb technique in the fretting hand is used very often in this one, & is essential to keep the bass moving while allowing longer melody notes to be held out on the higher strings.

ps : Sorry i wasn’t able to include some of that Spanish-style acoustic soloing that you hear on the original. I was tempted to try & add that as well. But then I remembered that I have 97 more songs to get to sooo…. hopefully this is enough to call this one done. I’ll be back tomorrow with another classic song!

“Ain’t No Sunshine” - Bill Withers

We had some work done to the house yesterday & it knocked our only bathroom our of commission for 24 hours. Taylor took Remi to stay overnight at her Mom’s place, while I stayed here to finish up some work. This was the first night the three of us have slept apart in over a year. So I found myself in quite a natural place to be practicing this one, kinda living out this song. Although it is kinda strange to have events in your life sync up with a soundtrack.

This song is such a well-known classic, from the great Bill Withers. It’s almost a rite of passage among acoustic guitar players to play this one. This arrangement manages to use the same bass-groove guitar riff that Bill used on the record when he performed this song back in the 1970’s - but it also requires the soloist to play the vocal melody at the same time. The result is an arrangement that is technically simple, but rhythmically a little complicated to pull off - especially during the “I-know-I-know-I-know…” part. But even novice guitarists shouldn’t be intimidated by this. If you just hang in there, you can easily make this one sing.

The TAB in the book gives an open G for each final chord of the main riff. I used a G7 shell instead. If you don’t know what that is, don’t worry the open G sounds just fine, but the G7 sounded more like what I remember hearing on the record. Anyway, playing this song made me feel a little better while I was missing my girl. Thanks for listening!

ps. Sorry if this video is a little dark. I recorded it in the sun-room at a time when there weren’t no sunshine.

“Africa” - Toto

I found this arrangement super-fun to play!! I deviated a bit from the book tab by adding strumming to the chorus. Which is a good thing to remember when working from music thats written out for you on paper : what’s written down is really just a suggestion. You gotta always apply your own musical creativity here & there in order to bring the piece to life as best you can. Hope you enjoy listening. I’ll be back tomorrow with the next song (in alphabetical order). Can you guess what it might be??

ps. very sorry about the lawn mower coming in at the end! ah well, what are you gonna do? Just a part of the sun-room sound i guess.